I threw together this quick pasta dish for our second anniversary tonight, and it sort of reminds me of Julie- beautiful to look at, and then filled with such rich gooey warmth it just made me glad that I was smart enough to order such a great dish.
Uh, something like that. I'm not exactly good with the mushy stuff, but I've got the most perfect wife I could have ever wished for.
This was the dish I alluded to in my "Wokking the Plank" post last week, using more of the ingredients I picked up at Lee Lee Oriental Market recently. I picked up some baby bok choy and some baby eggplant that looked good, and some larger scallions. I made some homemade teriyaki sauce, using only half the sugar to marinate the salmon.
Once the salmon was under the broiler I added the remaining sugar to the marinade and reduced it by about 30%. I stir fried the eggplant first in some peanut oil to get a good color on it, then put it aside while I did the bok choy. I added the eggplant back, tossed in the scallions, then added a bit of the sauce to give it a nice color.
I topped it with some toasted sesame seeds after I took the picture, and we feasted until we couldn't eat any more. Good, good stuff.
I broiled some halibut steaks to accompany the avocado rolls I made for our Sunday dinner. Halibut is awesome in Japanese dishes, cooked or raw. It has a delicate flavor that seems to really appeal to somewhat squeamish fish eaters, so try it sometime you're serving fish to those you're not sure like it.
This was really easy- broiled dry, then I pulled out the center bones with a set of hemostats I like to use for boning fish. I topped the steaks with ponzu sauce, which is a lemony sort of soy sauce with some dried bonito flakes, broiled again for a minute or so, then plated with scallions and fresh ginger. I should've marinated the fish in ponzu with the ginger for a while, but it slipped my mind as I was putting together the sushi. We survived, in fine style!
Although you might translate basa as "bass", it's actually a type of catfish. A firm white fish with reddish coloring, it's ideal for breading. These filets were done the simplest way possible, in a one quart Ziploc bag with a 3:1 mixtture of flour and Survival Spice®, then broiled.
I served this with flour tortillas warmed on my griddle, thinly sliced red onions, black beans, lime juice, and some guacamole that I'll post later. Crazy good.
This is a quick and simple dish, relatively speaking, with minimal prep required, which these days is about at the top of the priority list. A beurre blanc sauce, literally 'white butter', is done with whole butter, white wine, lemon juice, parsley and shallots at its most basic form, but is really easy to embellish with things like red bell pepper, capers and whatever else you feel like throwing in there. My ratio of butter to lemon juice wasn't high enough to make this a 'textbook' beurre blanc, but this slightly lighter version was still amazing.
The main trick to a beurre blanc is to not heat the butter to the point of splitting. I dimly remember that being around 137º from my culinary school days, but the basic technique to this pan sauce is to give your skillet a quick wipe after you've removed whatever meat you've cooked, then adding the shallots, and sweating them a minute or two. Deglaze with a shot of white wine, reduce this to 'au sec', or nearly dry, then add your whole butter. Alternate between on and off the heat, swirling your pan almost continuously, until the mixture emulsifies. Thin with lots of lemon juice, toss in some chopped parsley if you like, or cilantro, then plate 'er up.
The acidity of the white wine and lemon juice makes this sauce much lighter than you'd expect. As far as the fish goes, all I did was season it with a bit of Survival Spice® and sauteed it in our Tibvrtini Olio Extra Virgene di Oliva, then kept it warm on a sizzle plate.
If you want to keep playing with butter sauces after you've tried this, a beurre noisette, or browned butter sauce is absolutely amazing, but that's another day.
Okay, I hate to start the week with something so racy, but let's get the juvenile part of this out of the way- "Puttan" means "whore".
To me, the most credible explanation of the origin of "alla Puttanesca" is that because it's a dish that can be thrown together using only pantry ingredients so quickly, the working girls could have a quick meal in between dates. I've also heard that the aroma would draw in customers. Maybe one led to another, who knows?
Our dinner last night is not the classic version. I make a classic puttanesca the way that I was taught- by sauteeing some roughly chopped tomatoes, garlic, chopped anchovy, capers, olives, with a chiffonade of parsley and basil. Then I add some cooked pasta, toss, then take off the heat, along with a good drizzle of Tibvrtini Olio Extra Virgine di Oliva.
I started out to do the classic version last night, but because we wanted to incorporate salmon with the fettucine, the Alfredo option came to mind. Being me, instead of doing one or the other, I decided to try to smash the two sauces together.
I was lucky enough to have some leftover artichokes on hand, so in they went into a saute pan with tomato concassee, black Greek olives, red bell pepper, green onions, and copious amounts of garlic. Once the veggies were done I browned off some cubes of a nice salmon filet. Once the fish was out of the skillet, I deglazed the pan with some white wine, reducing it 50%. I added a little chicken stock, reduced it a bit, then finished it off with some cream. I added back the veggies, seasoned the sauce and then added back my pre cooked fresh fettucine. Quick toss, then a few minutes with the fish back in the pan, and it was all done, ready for lots of Parm Reggiano.
It was really, really good and I didn't have to cook it under a red light...
I hope you all had a great Fourth of July!
My menu planning for yesterday was dictated by the 116º scorcher we had. You know me- I love to take a day to smoke a big ol' hunk of meat, but after a day outside sunnin' and funnin', the last thing I wanted to do was spend a lot of time over a hot grill.
So... with operating parameters set, what to make? On hand- shrimp, leftover brown rice, tomatoes, a red onion, cilantro and a globe eggplant. Easily obtained at the market- red bell peppers, anaheim chiles, lemons, and jalapenos. Aha! I have a plan...
I cut the eggplant in wedges, removing about half the skin and salting them fairly liberally, then cut the peppers into wedges, too. Into a one gallon ziploc bag they went with the red onion, with an obscene amount of crushed garlic, some Tibvrtini Olio Extra Virgene di Oliva, a spash of Tibvrtini Aceto di Vino Blanco, and some kosher salt and black pepper. I left them at room temperature to marinate while I tossed the shrimp into another bag with some more garlic (okay, a lot more) and plenty of Survival Spice™, which absolutely rocks on grilled shrimp.
All that was left to prep was to concasse some roma tomatoes, and clean some cilantro. Into a work bowl they went.
I built a hot fire with pecan wood, and let it settle down a bit. Once everything was marinated, I emptied the bag of veggies onto the hot grill, then went about getting some serious color on the veggies. The eggplant got special attention, blackening the skins and filling the eggplant wedges with tons of pecan flavor.
Once the veggies had great color, but were still between al dente and fully cooked, I took them off the grill, chopping them coarsely and adding them to the cilantro, brown rice and tomatoes already in the work bowl. I added a glug of Tibrtini Novello, about half a lemon's worth of juice, and seasoned to taste.
While that sat, I grilled off the shrimp at high heat just long enough to change the color, and squeezed some lemon juice on them before I took them off the grill.
Plated it up, and man did it hit the spot. Light, but huge flavors, and just the right temperature on a scorching day.
Try this technique with whatever you have on hand. It's the perfect summer meal.
Travel Day again today, but finally I'm headed home, ready to get back to work!
This was a pan-fried salmon filet that I marinated in soy, mirin, lemon juice and some chili/garlic paste. I'll admit, brussel sprouts weren't exactly the traditional Japanese accompianment, but they tasted good! I just steamed them, and added some butter and S&P.
Now, if I had eaten like this the whole time I was in the Midwest, my jeans wouldn't be so tight.
Say, are those Christmas cookies?...
Here's a refinement on the Scaryaki sauce I've posted about a few times here so far, with an adjustment for the salmon I had on hand.
I wanted something a little more traditional in terms of the sweetness a typical teriyaki sauce has, but with the heat in my "scaryaki" version, so I added a touch of honey to the usual blend of soy, hot chili garlic paste, and Sriracha hot sauce, with just a touch of sesame oil. After letting the fish marinade for about half an hour, I drizzled a bit of canola oil on the fish as my skillet was heating up. Why do I oil the fish, and not the skillet? Because if you do it this way, you'll have far less spattering, because there's no extra oil in the pan.
The honey I added this time forced me to change my cooking technique somewhat- instead of being able to sear the salmon at high heat, which of course would burn the honey, I settled on medium to medium high heat this time.
I served this with brown rice and a salad similar to the one in the Scaryaki Halibut post. Mmmmmm.....
So, cook anything good this weekend? Give!
After a busy day, there's nothing simpler than firing up a good gas grill with a few wood chips and grilling your dinner. No pots, no pans, very little cleanup, and really delicious.
Last night was salmon filets, oiled and rubbed generously with our Survival Spice™ barbecue rub, which is fantastic on salmon. After the salmon was on the grill for a few minutes, I added some lightly oiled and seasoned asparagus. A good squirt of fresh lemon juice during the last 5 minutes of cooking, and that was it.
Healthy, amazing and easy. Three of my favorite words.
What did you have for dinner last night?
